PM, PARLIAMENT SPEAKER, FORMER FOREIGN MINISTER ON MESIC SPEECH

ZAGREB, Jan 16 (Hina) - Commenting on an address President Stjepan Mesic made at a special parliamentary session on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of Croatia's international recognition on Tuesday, Prime Minister Ivica Racan said the President was entitled to speak as he pleased, even critically, about Croatia's recent history. "People may agree with President Mesic or not, and this is all I can say," Racan told a late television newscast on Tuesday. The PM sees no reason why someone should refrain from being critical about some things in Croatia's past, and said it was another issue when the criticism was made. In the same newscast, parliamentary speaker Zlatko Tomcic said the head of state had the right to make assessments which some might find "to their liking and some (might) not," but added he personally would have spoken more gently. Croatia's foreign minister in 1991-2, Zvonimir Separovic, described Mesic's address as an "absolute scandal which should not have occurred." On behalf of the victims killed in the Homeland War, he protested against Mesic's allusions to former President Franjo Tudjman and the reasons behind Croatia's international isolation at the time. Croatia was not isolated because of Tudjman but the diplomatic mistakes and faults of former foreign minister Mate Granic's "excessively permissive" policy, Separovic said in the newscast. (hina) ha